Alright guys, I need advice in the way of diet and training. I don’t know if what I’m doing is quite right, your help will be much appreciated. I’ll leave my stats and current training program for you to evaluate and critique. Progress seems to be slow to non existent for the past two months.

I have been on this cut since the first of this year. I am down 20lb since then. When progress slowed in april I kept up with my current diet until the end of may. I then tried a keto diet for three weeks, up until last week. Now I’m not sure what to do.

Do you really want to be 6’1" and 155lbs? I’d look at adding muscle. 10lbs of lean mass will bring your bodyfat percentage down (even if you add some fat) and make it easier dor you to drop further weight.

I’ve always had some love handles and a bit of a belly that I’d like to get rid of before I start to add weight, it seems like they just blow up whenever I take in enough calories to add mass. Is it possible I could still gain muscle on a slight deficit?

I used to be 6’1", buy my Doctor says I am only 5’11" now - I’m shrinking with age. Anyway, I way 186 pounds at just under 14% body fat on my way to 10% after a few weeks of bulking (never again). You really should look at adding LBM now, while you have a ton of natural testosterone - keep cutting and you could fuck up your HPTA and end up skinny fat for the rest of your life.

Find a good beginner program, Greyskull, SS, 5/3/1 beginner template. Eat 200 calories a day over your maintenance. Weigh and measure to track, adjust as needed. I’d rather see you get a ton of exercise, gym and otherwise, and eat 4000 calories a day, than get skinny fat on a cut.

Thank you for the input guys. I watched the video, and I actually am encountering some of the problems he named. I’ve been lifting for a couple years, but only eating right for about one year. Is a beginner template optimal for me? I’d say I’m moderately strong (can post maxes if needed). How much over maintenance should i eat to add some muscle? And should I probably add cals slowly; 200 a week or so?

[quote]I don’t want to undermine everything I’ve worked for already
[…]
“Progress seems to be slow to non existent for the past two months.”[/quote]
Whatever you’ve worked for stopped working a while ago.

And nobody said permabulk. JFG said you should focus on gaining muscle for a few years instead of a few months. That’s solid advice. If you interpreted that as “eat a ton, get a gut, but it’s cool ‘cuz you’re gettin’ gainz”, that’s not his fault.

But okay, let’s look at what you’re thinking about doing. “Focus on gaining muscle for a few months, then switch back to fat loss”. So, you’d gain 10, maybe 15 pounds in a few months, being very generous. I get the impression you’d still be conservative with the calories, so you won’t be gaining as much as you could.

Then you flip to a fat loss plan for however long and you lose 15 or more pounds (because, as was mentioned, fat loss is simple). So, when all’s said and done, you’re, at best, right back to where you started possibly minus a little bodyfat.

Instead of continuing to stifle progress by eating with fad diets (intermittent fasting, avoiding carbs, etc.), it would be smarter to capitalize on the one time in your life that pretty much every lifter would go back to if they had the chance to do over.

A tall, underweight, teenager is absolutely in the perfect position to gain a metric crapton of lean muscle if he trains hard and is well-fed, but your focus on fat loss is hamstringing your overall progress.

What exactly would your recommendations be then? I am going to be conservative with calories, for now. I’m going to add 150 cals each week until I’m seeing the muscle gain desired. I started blending size and strength 2.0 on Monday. Unless you believe there is a better training program that would be optimal for me?

Blending Size and Strength is good. If I were you I’d go on a program like it and make sure it is different from what I’ve been doing so far. The change usually helps progress a lot. Diet-wise, adding a surplus is a good idea but I’d do it different. I’d start with a 200cal surplus for three weeks and then re-evaluate if needed. Considering your age, you may have to up it to 300 or more, but stick to your initial surplus first to measure progress. Also, I’d take the majority of carbs before and after a workout and not in the evening. Hope this helps. Let us know how you’re getting on.